I just got this game for the PS3 not too long ago, and I felt I should review this.

First, the graphics. This game is probably one of the most beautiful games I have EVER played. The graphics are absolutely gorgeous and can actually have you playing for quite some time just looking around at the wonderful scenery. When your above ground, vast expanses of trees strech out across the horizon. Also, on the PS3 version, it seems that there is a farther draw distance, so there is more scenery in the surroundings than in the other versions.

However, the detail of the graphics can lead to a few problems. The framerate for example, on all the console versions, are all pretty bad. However, the framerate is probably the worst on the PS3 version, as most game developers are not yet taking advantage of the PS3's cell processor. In any case, the framerate can get pretty choppy sometimes, even going so far as actually freezing for a while on extremely rare occasions. The loading times also take longer than they seem they should. Also, the draw distance can be an issue, with scenery sometimes just popping up randomly right in front of you.

Now for gameplay. The gameplay is still pretty much the same as it was in Morrowind, with some drastic upgrades.

The first is combat. In Morrowind, a lot of the times your attack would miss due to a poor combat system, which has now been addressed. In Oblivion, you don't need your attack to be dead on for it to hit, which makes fighting much much easier. Also they have made it easier to equip items, weapons, and magic with a new quick-select menu, which simplifies the equip menu by letting you equip things with going into the inventory screen.

The next new addition is that they have introduced new methods and mini games to build up certain skills

One of the first ones is lockpicking. It works kind of like how it works in Splinter Cell, you can see the lock and your pick, and you must set the separate teeth in place to unlock the...lock...yeah. You hit the tooth, and must press a button to hold it in place at it's highest point. This may seem easy but it's really quite difficult.

Another one is alchemy. Rather than just simply dragging one ingrediant to another, you must first have a mortar and pestle. Then you have a certain amount of slots to place ingredients in. You must arrange the correct ingredients together and you will have a potion. The best part is that you can find the ingredients literally almost anywhere.

the last one I've noticed is for building up someone's trust of you. You have a spinning dial, and you have four options: Admire, joke, intimidate, and brag. You have a transparent disc that goes out to certain extents, which determines how strong the comment will be, and Every time you pick an option, the disc spins one place. The person you are talking to also has certain things that they will love being said to them, things they will like, things they will feel neutral on, and things that will make them more hostile. If it starts getting bad, you can also bribe them, but that won't stop the game.

All in all, I give this game an 8/10. It's a wonderful game, but it's not for everyone, and framerate issues and draw distance flaws plague this game.

In the Persuasion Minigame some characters respond better to the selection "Coerce", so in that respect a form of intimidation is good. Also, if you find the need to take someone out of the picture without getting a bounty you can use the Persuasion Minigame in reverse and bring their disposition score down to zero. After which they will attack you and you can gleefully slice and dice without fear of being locked up.

Also, other than the fact that the Disposition Score counts backwards while you are playing the game to make it more challenging there really is no limit to how long you can work with someone. So even if you do bring the score down quite low unintentionally you can just keep working at it until you max out the individuals Disposition. The only time you really need to bribe is if the individuals maximum Disposition is lower than what you need to get information out of them....

Nice review! I liked the line about resorting to bribes if you've made a mess of the trust issue in the past.

Just curious -- does it ever make sense to intimidate someone? Intimidation seems to be a bad way to make someone non-hostile.

Heh, that´s one thing I wondered about two when I played it. In Morrowind if you intimidated them (successfully), their disposition was temporarily raised to 100, so that they would do anything. But if you tried to speak to them again, it was at 0, and I don´t think it could be boosted again.

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